Christmasing {Train Ride + Temple Square Lights}

Being back in Utah at Christmastime meant we had a lot of familying time.  One of the fun outings we took was to Salt Lake City to see the lights at Temple Square.  We drove from Logan (we'd been there doing this that morning) to the Ogden FrontRunner Station just in time to catch the train to Salt Lake (and get soaked from the rain - rain! in December! - in the process).  I thought Callie would absolutely love seeing all the lights, but actually the biggest highlight for her was the train ride, I think.  Again, "no buckles!" and "a table!".  Pretty neat stuff.

We made it through the rain!

Soaking wet hair on our little girl - luckily
she dried out on the ride South.

bonus video!

choo choo the big train

Sambo and Dad liked the train, too.

Bundled up like a kangaroo.

We got to Salt Lake, jumped off FrontRunner and hopped on Trax to take us downtown to our first stop: Siegfried's, where we met up with the rest of the Blanch Herd for a delicious belated birthday dinner for Heather.

Reubens, rotkohl, sauerkraut and spaetzle with gravy for us!
My mouth is watering!

Sam enjoyed the meal a different way.

After our bellies were sufficiently filled, we bundled up - we thought it would be a miserable lights viewing trip due to all the rain that was pounding down on the train the whole ride down, but miraculously, Salt Lake was dry as a bone, and not even too cold! - and trekked a couple blocks over to Temple Square.  The lights were fantastic, as usual.  What a sight!

Callie adores her cousins!

And luckily they don't think she's too bad either.

A good lookin' herd of blanches, there.

I love to see the temple!

My all-time favorite red tree!  So fun to see it
in person again after a few years of living out
of state.

My fam and the red tree!  Love.
(insert heart eyes emoji here)

I had to add this one.  Because Callie's face.  Sheesh.

Grandpa was a good sport to carry Cal a while so Mom's arms
could take a break.  (She's a small little thing, but not as light
as she used to be!)

Pit stop in the visitor's center to feed Sam and get warmed up.
Perfect time for a grandparent-grandkid photo op, right?

And then we were off to the station again!

We finished up our lights-viewing and sidewalk-wandering in time to catch Trax back to the intermodal hub for our connection back to Ogden on FrontRunner.  Unfortunately there were some delays, so we sat on the platform for a while.  And then we had some slow-downs while on the train once it finally came.  Needless to say we got home a lot later than we were hoping/planning, but luckily we made some fun memories to see us through.